


Roamer Red

by disastrous_detail



Series: Unburnished [1]
Category: Elder Scrolls, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Alternate Canon, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bittersweet, Blood and Violence, Canon-Typical Violence, Erandur the Priest and His Disaster Son, Found Family, Gen, Mental Health Issues, Morally Ambiguous Character
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:14:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28200723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disastrous_detail/pseuds/disastrous_detail
Summary: Celemir is only ten when his world comes crashing down. He clings to survival, and through his struggles, becomes one of the most feared mercenaries in all of Tamriel. Guarded and jaded, he wants nothing to do with others, preferring his lonely place at the top.When nightmares plague the sleepy port town of Dawnstar, he is forced to team with a remorseful priest and discovers that no man is an island.
Relationships: Dovahkiin | Dragonborn & Erandur
Series: Unburnished [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2065854
Comments: 16
Kudos: 20





	1. First Blood

Celemir doesn’t like the other kids in the village. He can’t put it into words too well because he’s not good at words. He mumbles. His grandparents taught him to describe what he’s feeling with his hands, and it’s still not enough.

This ‘doesn’t like’ is more than both his arms stretched out wide, and definitely more than his grandma or his grandpa’s arms stretched out wide. He isn’t certain this is a good unit of measurement, but it makes sense. Sometimes.

And so, he goes to the creek past the miller’s house. Nobody thinks to find him here. The trees and brambles are thick, and all children are banned from getting near the water side. The adults shout when they get near it. Nobody likes playing in the water anyway. It’s too cold for fun. 

He taps the water’s surface. The water ripples and then freezes into those tiny, glittering fractals. The water’s already cold. His little secret won’t hurt anyone but him.

His fingers always go numb and bright red, but it’s the chill numbs the ache. Along his arms, are bruises to match scrapes and cuts on his knuckles. Still, none of it hurts worse than his nose. The bleeding’s stopped for now, and none of it’s gotten on his good shirt. Nan would be sad if he got a stain on it, and he’s already made her sad too many times.

His wooden practice sword lies on the creek-bed next to him. A solid crack mars the side, about to split. Grandpa made him this practice sword for his ninth birthday, knowing Celemir had been wanting one, although without knowing why.

His throat becomes tight. Vision blurring, his faces heats up because if Grandma or Grandpa learn about what happened today, he’ll never get another sword. He sits, knees hugged to his chest, and wonders if it’s not too late to run away.

He could find somewhere where there aren’t ugly people who stupidly ask him if he’s a changeling, or worse, ugly people who pointedly ask if his mama loves him, why doesn’t she ever come home and see him?

Celemir has no more excuses anymore. Grandma and Grandpa keep saying them, but Celemir can’t keep repeating them because they’re just simply not true. He knows the truth. He has known, and for a very long time, at that: his mother simply does not love him.

She doesn’t care about him. If she did, she’d come by more often. Whatever. If she won’t love him, he won’t love her.

Wiping the blood from his nose, Celemir decides he, in fact, hates his mother and not just his mother. He hates the village kids, too, and he hates them almost as much as _her_.

Yes, hate. That’s a good word, and he’s finally found it.

Grandpa doesn’t throw away Celemir’s wood sword when he learns of the thrashing Celemir had given the village kids. Grandpa holds it up. The weapon looks tiny in his hands as he looks it over.

Celemir belatedly remembers he hadn’t cleaned the blood off it. Would that change Grandpa’s mind? Knowing he’d drawn blood?

The fireplace behind Grandma and Grandpa crackles, soon to need more fuel. The heat stifles the drawing room, but still the pair of them sit underneath their blankets and felt.

Grandpa comments, 

“I’d even say you were even in the right of it.”

“Cuuril, we can’t just reward this type of behavior.”

“Why not? Celemir here won a four on one fight, only with a stick and his fists! That’s something to be proud of.”

“He broke a girl’s wrist with that thing.”

“So, we just let those little devils beat up on our grandson then? Is that what you suggest?”

“No, I’m suggesting we…” Grandma gestures between Celemir, Grandpa, and her,

“Find a teacher. He needs to control himself. Learn restraint.”

“I have some old friends from the Guild I can write to. They know something about that.” The chair creaks. Grandpa gets up and grabs for his cane. He goes off, leaving Celemir with Grandma.

Celemir looks down at the floor, hands grasping his shirt end tight. Grandma wasn’t nearly as happy as Grandpa was. He braces himself for whatever punishment she’s about to dole out. She sighs.

“Come here.”

He obediently marches over to her chair. The fire’s heat feels scorching on his skin as he draws near.

“Pull up your sleeves.”

He does as she asks, revealing dark purple bruises along his arms. She sighs again.

“Celemir…” She takes his hands hers, turning his arm over to see the rest of the bruises and cuts. Celemir mumbles,

“Doesn’t hurt.”

“Not now, it doesn’t.” A flicker of gold light appears in the corner of his vision. He winces his eyes shut. The restoration magic washes the aches out of his arms. She runs her hands down his arms, healing the bruises away.

“Maybe Cuuril will make a warrior out of you yet, but can I tell you a secret?”

Celemir opens one amber eye to peek at her. She smiles,

“I think you’d make a wonderful mage too— no need to get all beat up if you want to protect yourself. That’s what you special.”

“Can’t I do both?”

“It’ll be hard, honey, but yes, in time.” She fixes his hair,

“Because you are a blessing on this household, don’t ever forget it.”

She places a single kiss on his forehead. He nods. His mouth turns, and his throat hurts again. Celemir leaves and cries in the privacy of his own room. She always made him cry, one way or another.

The teacher Grandpa finds him is a young Breton man, hardly the grizzled warrior Celemir thought he’d be getting as a teacher, but Celemir soon finds he doesn’t care. He likes Mr. Moorsly. He’s pretty, with freckles across his cheeks and green eyes, but he’s also strong and nice. His ears are pointed too. Grandma had told him it was a sign he might be a good person.

Celemir believes her. Everyone who had round ears were usually mean. Well, minus Nan, only because Nan is the nicest lady ever, but is she pretty? Yes, he decides on the walk down to the courtyard. She is very pretty— hair the color of honey and warm, wide brown eyes. Those eyes remind of the deer that steal up to the garden at dawn.

Celemir doesn’t find himself ‘pretty’, with his long, russet hair always unruly, but he doesn’t need to be. He only cares about being strong. That’s what matters more. He ties the mess of hair back, and thinks that in fact, he doesn’t want to be pretty, nor nice. He wants people to be afraid of him, and they will be. One day.

Mr. Moorsly teaches him everything he knows over the long months that suddenly aren’t long at all. Winter melts into spring and spring blossoms into summer, and then fall, winter again. Celemir knows he’s proficient but much too small. Grandpa says he’ll have his first growing spurt soon –whatever that is, and Grandma says his body will start changing soon.

He tried asking Nan what any of this meant but she just smiles and says a lot of things that amount to nothing at all. Mr. Moorsly tells him that it’ll be hard, and that he’ll soon need a new teacher if he gets much bigger. Celemir hopes he was joking.

And when he isn’t outside, sparring with Mr. Moorsly, Grandma teaches him magic. They’re simple lessons, and they’re laced with exciting stories from her time as a Thalmor Justiciar. Celemir’s favorite stories are the ones about Grandma’s time fighting the Daedra, when she led raids into Oblivion itself with her comrades. 

Grandma is probably his favorite person. She’s sweet, but powerful, and everyone is afraid of her, as they should be. The Thalmor Justiciars, as Celemir has learned, are among the greatest mages that Nirn has every seen.

They’re brave and strong, being the modern heroes of the Altmeri people, and maybe that’s Celemir wants. He wants to be brave and strong, and more importantly, he wants to be admired by people like him.

When he tells his Grandma of this at dinner, she smiles, proud,

“And maybe one day, you’ll become a Justiciar too.” This bothers Grandpa. His gaze darkens, and he grumbles something under his breath in Altmeris.

The arguments Grandpa and Grandma have happen after they think Celemir has been put to bed, but Grandma forgets Celemir now knows a muffle spell.

Celemir listens at the door, peering through the keyhole, into the drawing room after his bedtime.

“That boy has no business becoming a Justiciar,” Grandpa states flatly. That tone unsettles Celemir. He’s never heard that voice out of Grandpa. It doesn’t cross Celemir’s mind that his Grandpa has more than a few good reasons why becoming Justiciar is _not_ a great thing.

“He has the makings of becoming a Justiciar, potentially more. Think of what Celemir could accomplish within the Dominion.”

“The Dominion will chew him up and spit him out, or have you forgotten who his father is?”

“I believe for amount of promise he has, that will only be a small consternation, but it won’t bar him.” Grandma gets up out of her chair, as if she weren’t over two-hundred years old, 

“I have my friends. One of whom is now a headmaster at one of the most prestigious finishing schools in the Isles. She agrees that Celemir would do well there, given a few more years of study.”

“This, living here, is all he’s ever known. He’s never had a friend his age, let alone friends at all. He won’t be able to handle the change. It’s too sudden.”

Strangely, Grandpa is right. The mention of that hurts. A lot. Celemir now knows why he shouldn’t be standing here, listening to this conversation, but yet he can’t seem to leave. He must know why he can’t become a Justiciar. Grandma will say something that will make this all better. She must.

Grandma inclines her slightly,

“He needs to become an Altmer and understand his place in society.”

“As if we hadn’t been doing that ourselves?”

“We live in Cyrodiil, the heart of the Empire. That ‘Whitestrake’ is worshipped by the masses along that disgusting ape.”

Grandma spits ‘ape’ with vitriol that scares Celemir more than Grandpa’s flat voice. He understood that hate in her voice, but it’s incredibly scary. He’s never heard her angry voice before, and it shocks him into staying stock-still by the door. Grandma continues,

“If he stays here, imagine how he might view himself, as an Elf, and what opportunities are there for a mage of his talent? The Mages' Guild is gone. The College of Whispers and Synod are accessory to the Imperial machine, and I will _not_ tolerate an Imperialist in this house.”

Much of these words and their meanings fly over Celemir’s head, but he knows they’re all important and better understood by adults. He wishes he understood what they mean.

“But he doesn’t have to become a mage, love.”

“It’s unthinkable that he were to throw that talent away. Perhaps, he becomes a scholar.”

“He’s not gentle enough for that.”

“Perhaps in time…”

But like most plans, they often go astray.

An outbreak struck in the dead of winter. The well-water infected; hundreds died from the illness. Celemir buries his grandparents when the ground thaws. Nan’s hands sat on his shoulders, and Mr. Moorsly hovered close by, both more likened to parents now than teachers.

More plans were made. Moorsly would have them cut their losses, head back home to High Rock with him, where he’d take care of them— both Nan and Celemir. Moorsly agreed to see Celemir to the city of Daggerfall, where Celemir would take a boat to Summerset, and begin his studies under Grandma’s closest friend- Galanthiel.

This time, Celemir had no predictions of the outcome. Grief warped him, stealing away his emotions, and leaving only a cold, numb demeanor behind.

He said next to nothing now, taking to his books and fencing lessons, but occasionally, practicing his magic. It was his grandma’s dying wish he become a powerful mage and a Justiciar—redeem the disgrace that was his mother. He could summon familiars, but no Daedra yet, and nor would he raise the dead.

Well, not until the bandits came that spring.

He lies on the drawing room floor, hands bound behind his back.

Nan stares him dead in the eye across the room, pink lips barely parted. A trickle of blood leaks out from them and her nose, blood from the wound she took the chest. The dark cylinder of a crossbow bolt pokes out from her collarbone.

While he stares into those now dull brown eyes, the bandits argue.

“Well, look at what you did now, you dumbass.”

“I didn’t see her coming! She surprised me!”

The bandits sounds like he feels bad for killing Nan but not for the right reasons.

“Well, at least we got this one.”

“What’re we gonna do with them? I’m not about to kill a little kid.”

“We can sell them to some pervert down in Rihad, I guess.”

The bandits argue more over that. Whatever a ‘pervert’ is or wherever ‘Rihad’ is, Celemir only knows he doesn’t like the sound of either. 

Celemir wonders if he can burn through these binds. They’re only rope, and he has fire, but before he can set the spark, a body crashes down the stairs, and a severed head bounces down. The bandits startle into action as Moorsly rushes through into drawing room, sabre drawn.

Moorsly kills one, then the next. The others rush into the room. Moorsly is caught from behind. He falls. His sabre clatters to the floor, useless. A bandit steps over Nan’s corpse and then steps over Celemir, great sword readied, heading to where Moorsly lies prone on the floor. Celemir slams his eyes shut.

 _Thunk_ goes the blade, cutting into even the floorboards. The air fills with the scent of fresh blood, and it finally hits Celemir that he’s alone. Completely alone.

The survivors talk. They throw glances Celemir’s way. There’s talk of looting the place and leaving Celemir behind. Some want to take Celemir with them, though they won’t say why. Celemir doesn’t want to know. He doesn’t want to be on his back like this.

He never wants to be like this ever again: choked by fear, nor at another’s mercy. Fear transforms into fuel, into anger, and then _rage_.

Nan coughs. Her mouth opens and closes once, teeth clacking, and her brown eyes roll back into her skull. She makes a wet, guttural moan in the back of her throat and jerks. This time, the bandits know it’s not Celemir making those noises. She whines as she rises. The sound becomes high-pitched, turning into a blood-curdling shriek. 

The bandits draw their weapons again and attack. Nan tears at their flesh like a rabid animal, having nothing left to lose in undeath. Celemir burns through his binds. He rolls away, finds Moorsly’s sabre on the floor.

By the time the bandits notice Celemir has a weapon, it’s too late for them. He hamstrings the first. Nan tears open the bandit’s throat with her teeth. The second thinks to tackle Celemir. They crash onto the floor. Nan howls.

Her nails tear at the man’s face, gouging out flesh, and her thumbs find his eyes and dig into them. The man screams as he falls forward. Celemir stabs him through the chest. Blood.

It splashes onto Celemir’s face and his chest, soaking through his linen night gown. The white cloth stains and clings to his skin. He pushes the bandit off him. Nan stares down at him. Her lips move, only a breathy gasp comes out.

But just for the briefest second, their eyes meet. Recognition lights a spark in her eyes, and then, she stumbles. Ashes flutter about as Nan collapses to the floor into a white pile of ashes.

Celemir stands alone in the drawing room. Blood drips from his night gown and the tip of the sabre’s blade.

He hates the bandits for killing Nan and Moorsly just as he wants to hate Moorsly and Nan for dying on him, but most of all, he hates the world and the circumstances that allowed this to happen.

Celemir swallows his tears and hates himself for crying.

He doesn’t know why.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am sorry. this is a lot. 
> 
> the rest of the fic won't be this dark :s


	2. Erandur

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Erandur!

The nightmares are taking their toll.

That, Erandur realizes the second he walks into the town of Dawnstar, freezing through his robes. These robes, underneath his cloak, are different now since the last time he walked these streets.

Warm and dyed marigold-yellow, these robes, along with the emblem of his Lady among his prayer beads, are a comfort in a place as dark as this, where the daylight hours and warmth are scant.

And Dawnstar is darker still because he knows what lies on the mountain overlooking the town; Nightcaller Temple. His stomach drops at the sight.

Save little can prepare him for the task ahead, but it must be done. This place, these memories, need to be put to rest. There isn’t a day that goes by where Erandur doesn’t think about what he could’ve done as Casimir, what he could’ve been. These scenarios haunt him night and day, despite what teachings he'd learned from the Temple. Unable to escape, the only options remains is to face the problem head-on. So, here he is now, staring down the sight of his greatest regret and triumph.

They’re one in the same. He left his brothers and sisters behind to die, but he also escaped the control of the cult—something he would’ve never wrested without being forced. 

Some love for his former family remains, but not the only whole-hearted, consuming love that he felt once long ago. He knows better now.  
  
Love doesn’t force you to forget about your family, your parents, and love doesn’t leave you with the ones who took your memories and hurt you.

Erandur, then Casimir, may have loved his family, but he doesn’t know if they loved him. Perhaps, it was a love in their own, twisted sort of way. He doesn’t think about it for too long. Haggard faces pass him on the street, barely cleared of snow and ice. Guards, miners, laborers, and runners alike share blood-shot eyes and greyish skin.

Inside the inn, the innkeeper slumps over the counter, too tired to stand upright, but too awake to sleep. He notices Erandur and waves blearily.

The man squints at Erandur’s robes and relief crosses his face,

“A priest of Mara? Ye gods, we haven’t seen one in these parts for at least a decade. Make yourself welcome here. Please.”

Erandur flushes at the welcome because it’s certainly not what he expected as a Dunmer priest in a Nord town, but he’ll take it. The inn is a cozy place. The floors are covered with furs and straw, pelts line the walls, and the hearth, sitting at the center of the room, crackles on.

And for all the warmth and comfort a place like this can give, nobody here has been sleeping well. The innkeeper’s daughter wanders about the room, languidly picking up cups and plates as she goes, her gaze dulled. The miners that pop in after work remain restless despite drinking their fill and more.

One approaches him the third night of his stay. She plops down next to him on the bench, voice slurring,

“Are you… Are you here to help?”

Erandur nods. The miner, upon second glance, is a grizzled middle-aged woman, who’s seen more than her fair of time in the mines.

“Oh, thank the gods.” Her fingers, stained black from working the ores, drum on the table,

“Father, I don’t know if I can handle any more nights like these. I honestly don’t. I’m losin’ too much sleep. My workers aren’t any better than me. Nobody’s sleepin’ well round here.”

“What’s the problem, exactly?” Erandur asks, already knowing the answer, but he can’t give away too much, lest the people he’s trying to help turn on him. She leans hard on her elbow, staring into her drink,

“Nightmares. Just the same ones, over and over again. I can’t get away from them. Never. Nobody else can either. The travelers don’t seem to have any problems, but they don’t live here. Not like we do.” The miner sighs,

“Whaddya think the problem is? You’d know, wouldn’t you?”

Erandur considers his response while he stares into his tea. Giving a direct response will only serve to cause a panic. No, he needed to be vague.

Careful, he tells himself before delivering a response, 

“I’ve been trying to make a careful sweep of the area, see if there’s any Daedric presence causing this.”

“Daedra? Well, I suppose that’s the only thing making any sense. Though, traveling about the Pale these days isn’t as safe as it used to be.”

Erandur nods again. He’d been warned of the dangers on the wagon-ride over: roving bandits, pirates just off the coast, frost trolls and falmer alike roam these parts. None of Skald’s armies remain here to quell the threats.

The miner turns her shoulders towards the rest of the room, bustling now that the hour’s grown later,

Y’know, you could try askin’ one of those mercenaries that frequent this place. See if they’ll help you.”

“I’ve never really known mercenaries to be charitable…” Erandur starts, uneasy.

Mercenaries are, in fact, the very last people he would ask, but the Jarl’s guards are stretched too thin, most having joined up with Stormcloak and his armies.

Despite living in Skyrim all his life, Erandur can barely believe there’s a civil war on the horizon. Just yesterday, it seemed, Torygg had taken his father’s throne, and now, the boy lies dead, and Skyrim’s split into chaos. 

“I’m sure some or one of them might lend you an ear. Can’t hurt to ask, and if it does, I’ll send the boys over to teach those mercs a lesson.”

Strangely enough, the miner’s words give Erandur the courage to get up and approach the mercenaries in the inn’s taproom.

Turns out, most of the mercenaries in the taproom are already employed, one way or another, as bodyguards for traveling merchants and ship captains. So far, none of them seem able to help, even if they wanted to.

The only mercenary Erandur hasn’t spoken to is the mercenary that the others fear. Only the Dunmer mercenary seems able to answer to Erandur’s question about said mercenary. 

“I haven’t gotten a look at the mer, but I reckon that’s Ol’ Red over there.”

One of the mercenaries, a Redguard joins them,

“Oh, wait, that’s him?” His brogue is thick, almost too much so for Erandur to understand him, but he joins them.

“I saw him at High King Torygg’s last tourney.”

“Aye, I did too. Bastard made winning the thing look easy. I don’t get it…” The Dunmer continues, throwing a dirty look towards the mer in question, 

“Why’s a merc like that even out here?”

“I’d wager work will dry up soon enough with him here.”

“Hopefully, he’ll find some other tourney to ruin before then.” The Redguard then adds, addressing Erandur, 

“But if anyone can get rid of your Daedra problem, it’s definitely him.”

Erandur takes their word for it and gets up, going over to the other side of the room, where nearest the far corner, sits a lone mer. He wears a heavy fur mantle on his cloak, and it almost hides away reddish hair and long pointed ears that could only belong to an Altmer.

It’s not exactly a creative nickname, if it’s in reference to his hair color, but somehow, in the man’s presence, he has inkling sensation that the title ‘the Red’ may not refer to just his hair.

Erandur clears his throat,

“Excuse me.”

“Mm?” The mer, presumably, turns where he sits on the bench. Only, Erandur can’t say he’s an Altmer either because Altmer, generally, do not have tusks. His eyes are amber, and his skin is tawny, not greenish.

“I need to ask you something. A proposition, I suppose.”

“Outside, then.” The bench creaks, and the mer gets up. He towers over Erandur and has to duck under the doorway when he leaves the room. Erandur follows him out onto the freezing porch. 

  
  
“I’m not a Vigilant of Stendarr,” The mercenary finally says. His voice is flat, and his facial expression never gives anything away. Erandur hadn’t been certain whether his words swayed the mercenary, but the outright rejection leaves Erandur’s feathers ruffled.

“You realize what’s at stake here?”

“Then go ask the Vigilants down south to help. This ain’t my problem to deal with.”

Hot blood rushes to Erandur’s face. The people here are under immense psychological strain and suffering from the Skull. Taking a week to go south, in the Pale, without protection, is near unthinkable. He doesn’t know what kind of state people will be in once he returns, but he fears some will be asleep, never to awaken again. Such are the consequences of prolonged exposure to the Skull of Vaermina, and those aren’t even the worst ones.

“This is much worse than you think.”

“All the more reason to see those Vigilants, then.” The mercenary stalks back inside, leaving Erandur to the cold.

A Khajiit caravan heading south is sympathetic to his efforts, and they allow to travel with them southwards, to the border of Hjaalmarch.

It is there that he then made eastwards, towards the borders between Whiterun and the Pale. These roads, Erandur knowing them all too well, took him to the seat of Skyborn mountains.

The Vigilant of Stendarr, as he knew, were akin to the Maran knights, and so, he hoped they would listen to him without suspecting him of once being in the Vaerminian Cult. No one had done so, yet, but the Vigil rooted out Daedra cults like hounds out for blood.

And if he did tell them, how would they react? Would they even believe he’d taken to worshipping the Eight?

The Pale’s skies above him are bleak and grey now since winter has closed in, and the snow spans further than what the eye can see. The chill finds him where he stops on the snowy road.

If they learn the truth, they may kill him. How would they be able to trust him, especially in situation as precarious as the one in Nightcaller Temple?

Erandur knows he wouldn’t be able to keep the truth from them, and perhaps, to die wouldn’t so bad. The Vigilant would handle the Skull, banish it back to Oblivion, and he would be with Lady Mara.

Dying couldn’t be so terrible, he decides, and marches over the hill. At its top, he pauses, legs locked into place as the smell of smoke hits him.

The gusts of black smoke rise into the pale skies, and the plumes obscure the ruins lying by the mountainside. The crisp in the air turns the smell sour.

He has not the first idea who or what would attack the Hall of the Vigilant, and he can only blink as his plans come tumbling apart once again.

It is a somber journey back to Dawnstar.

He doesn’t care if this endeavor kills him. It likely will. On his trek south, he learned that the threat of dying can’t scare him. So, Erandur prepares, buying magicka potions, and a few scrolls, lest he run out of said potions.

The alchemist, a haggard, white-haired widow, places a crate of the potions onto the counter.

“That’ll be…” She works her mouth, mind straining for the price. Erandur removes his coinpurse from his belt. The alchemist takes it, peers inside, and says,

“Let me get you some change.”

“Keep it, please.”

The alchemist doesn’t like it, as much as the innkeeper doesn’t like charging Erandur for room and board. But like innkeeper, she stows away the money, murmuring reluctant, 

“If you’re certain…”

For where he’s going, he won’t need money. Perhaps, he’ll never need money again, for Nightcaller may very well be his grave. The door opens and closes. Heavy footsteps knock on the floorboards behind. Erandur turns, and the figure is all too familiar. Somehow, his lip doesn’t curl at the sight of the man, and perhaps because this gives him the slightest bloom of hope.

The mercenary explains, 

“Miners pooled some money together and hired me to do something about these nightmares, said to come find you.”

 _Oh, so he had to be bribed into doing this. Of course, typical mercenaries,_ is what Erandur first thinks, but what he says is,

“I see.”

His second thought is: _Thank Mara and the Eight and all their Glory, we might actually have a chance now._

The relief doesn’t last. The mercenary glances about the alchemist’s shop, eyes the potions on the shelves before turning back towards the door,

“Well, best be getting on then, priest.”  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as i was picturing what celemir looked like as an adult, i realized: you know who celemir looks like? fucking ganondorf. dude. GANONDORF. 
> 
> so he will now be referred to as Great Value Ganondorf in the notes :)


	3. Celemir

Celemir doesn’t like this priest. There’s something about the Dunmer that unsettles him, and he can’t quite put a finger on it. He’s also never liked priests, and he doubts this one will change his mind.

 _If anything_ , Celemir figures, _it’ll only continue to prove me right for not liking them._

His crossbow’s bolts are laced with a silencing poison –left over from his last job, hunting down a rogue wizard, and the ebony sword hanging from his belt can cut a week into nine days, now sharpened and repaired. Most importantly, his magicka stores are full since he took rest in Dawnstar. 

With these weapons, magic included, he likes to think he has nothing to fear, but he, like everyone else and their mother, knows Daedra aren’t to be trifled with.

The priest, now leading the way, turns from where he stands further up the snowy hillside,

“It’s just a bit further, but I don’t know what’ll be waiting for us outside.”

 _Sure, you don’t._ Celemir thinks, but he says instead,

“Lemme take point then.”

He marches ahead through the thick snow covering the hillside and packs it down. Their travel’s pace hastens.

This hillside and the tower looming at its peak had been a source of tales and legends around Dawnstar –like the Black Door hidden in the rock. The snow-weathered spire, once a Legion outpost, remains abandoned again, even after a cult took up within the ruins.

Devil-worshippers, the Nords called them with curled lips. Same Nords that would’ve never shut up about ‘culling the Daedra worshippers’, but they hadn’t done it. No one quite knows why the temple remains quiet, minus this priest.

He’d explained it was a Vaerminan cult here— hence the nightmares. He’d even explained that the temple had been attacked by Orc raiders. Why not bandits? Or Legion soldiers? None of the Nords mentioned the Orcs, and the Jarl wouldn’t have tolerated an Orc raiding party on his lands, unless…

Unless, the Jarl never knew about it, then why would the priest know, specifically, it was a group of Orcs? Celemir grimaces under the scarf covering the lower half of his face. It’s too convenient. Too helpful.

Nothing good ever comes out of contracts likes these, nor the people too forth-coming, too eager to do some good. Nobody is truly like that.

The spiders haunting the temple grounds die easily. He wrests his sword from the sludge of spider innards and flicks the blood off the blade with the twist of a wrist, but he does not sheath the blade, and the priest doesn’t notice.  
  
The priest's mace, more cudgel than a true mace, drips with thick spider blood, and he rights himself upright with a sigh,

“Thank goodness it was only them. Come, I have a way-shrine set up inside. It’ll protect us from the effects of the Daedric influence. And the cold.”

“Right.”

Celemir follows him into the decrepit building. Cobwebs, thankfully not spiderwebs, hang from the rafters, and the dust filters about freely, motes caught in lantern light. The priest shuffles past the crumbling pillars towards the bronze shrine left of the lectern and the molded pews before it.

One face stares back out at them from the dark, features worn from time, but the face and the intricate details of the stonework remain: Vaermina. He grits his teeth. Now, for the moment of truth, his hand clenches the hilt of his sword, and magicka flares in his left hand.

“Who are you?”

The priest turns from the shrine. In his hand, a lighter. Smoke from the burning incense curls and twists away, and with the remaining flame, he lights the candles around the shrine, and they halo the bust of Mara. 

“My name is Erandur, and you—”

Celemir cuts him off,

“I’m not talking about that. Why are you really here?”

The priest pauses. His features twist, not into anger, but something else, something Celemir hates more than open hostility, pity.

Erandur sighs and flatly observes,

“You can barely take my word, can you?”

“I don’t know the first thing about you, and you know too much about what happened here. I’m not wrong for being suspicious.” Celemir adds,

“This is a secluded location. No one will know what happens here, but that’s not a concern for _me_.”

The threat hangs in the air for a moment longer. Erandur places the lantern on the shrine, removes the mace from his belt, and lays it next to the lantern.

“I understand what this looks like, and you’re partly correct, if I’m correctly assuming what you think.”

“And that is?”

“You think I’m part of the cult, do you not?”

“Obviously.”

Erandur patiently nods,

“I was. When I was a child, I was taken.”

The words drum memories of voices and thoughts that bang on the walls Celemir has constructed in his mind since that time. He doesn’t go past those walls, and he never will.  
  
Erandur continues, 

“And I had my memories wiped, as is the custom for acolytes. I don’t remember my family, or much of my childhood in general. I only had the cult of Vaermina. _They_ became my family.”

“But that’s not…” Celemir tries, but the rest of the words won’t come out. He’s never been good with words. He only knows and knows all too well that it’s wrong.

Erandur finishes Celemir’s sentence easily,

“No, it’s not.”  
  
He steps away from the shrine where his only weapons lies. Now well out of arm’s reach of it, Erandur says, 

“So, kill me, if you wish, but please know I tried. It’s all a man can do— understand what he’s done wrong and try to make amends.”

Hidden by his gauntlets, Celemir’s knuckles turn grey as he clenches the sword in his grasp. Killing Erandur would set his worries aside forever, but he doesn’t want to kill the priest. Not truly. Logically, he knows this talk could be a ploy to manipulate him, and worst of all, his conscience fleetingly registers, it’s working.

If the priest truly were a Daedric cultist, he imagined they would have come at him by now, but Erandur hasn’t. There’s still a chance… This, Celemir holds in his chest as he lowers his weapon,

“You live for now, but if you so much as give me even the slightest doubt…”

“You’ll kill me. Yes, I understand.”

Erandur’s lips purse, as he’s forgotten something, unbothered by the threat. He goes around the side of the altar and opens a chest. His knees crack as he crouches by it. Rummaging through the contents, he comments,

“But before we head into the temple proper, I need to grab my prayer beads. They’ll be useful in the banishing ritual.”

“For?”

“The Skull of Corruption. That’s the source of the nightmares.” With his prayer beads in hand, Erandur steps around the chest and goes back to the altar. 

“But there’s a catch.” Celemir states, eyeing Erandur’s mace. Erandur fastens the weapon back to his belt,

“Yes, that’s where you come in.” He sizes up Celemir.

“You look more than capable, I suppose.” Erandur purses his lips again. Doubt flashes across his face again,

“But it is just the two of us.”

“How many?” Celemir asks, dread blooming in his chest, and he knows that he has faced worse numbers before –impossible odds, to some. He still doesn’t like this. How are these Orcs still alive? Erandur had mentioned this all happened decades ago on the hike up here. 

“Imagine a stronghold’s worth of angry, sleep-deprived Orcs,” Erandur starts. He grabs up his lantern and leads them to the back of the antechamber where the relief of Vaermina waits.

“And then, imagine a Daedric cult in possession of their Prince’s primary artifact…”  
  
Before Erandur can continue, Celemir interjects,

“But you said it’s been sealed for decades. This place ought to be a tomb.”

“Some may yet live.”

“How? Were they preserved somehow?”

“To stop the fighting, and more importantly, protect the Skull, a vapor dubbed ‘the Miasma’ was used. It places the imbiber in a deep rest. We used it first for rituals, but later, it became a means for preservation.”

Erandur stops at the relief before them, and the lantern’s light swarms over the relief. The details are painstakingly made although covered in thick dust. Celemir pulls his scarf up over his mouth and nose. The interior will be worse with even more dust, and likely, will smell much worse because of the corpses too.

“Once we open this, the Miasma will dissipate out, and everyone still alive will awaken. Because of the Miasma’s side-effects, they won’t know it’s been decades. Neither will their minds be fully intact, I imagine. They’ve been prey to the Skull this entire time.”

The dust in the antechamber settles in the back of his throat, Celemir swallows,

“Alright.”

Erandur pauses at the curt, unbothered response. Celemir gestures ‘go ahead’ at the relief on the wall, and Erandur, without further prompting, gets to work.

The fighting, which is to say, it’s fighting. Nothing new. People die, and their corpses join those already withering on the floors. More often than not, he has to back-up Erandur, but it’s fine. He’s had even less helpful companions on a job.

Getting through the raiders poses some difficult. That isn’t to say the Orcs can’t be bested in despite of the phrase ‘no one bests an Orc’ being thrown about every other damn skirmish in these halls. He rests against the wall, hours since passed. His plates of his armor clank, and sweat gathers on the back of his neck, where his helmet brushes against his bare skin.

Erandur had mentioned they needed inside this laboratory for some reason before they were set upon by more cultists.

Celemir removes his helm, holding onto it by one of its horns, 

“What now, priest?”

“I have a name.”

“I’ll call you it, if you survive.” Celemir says flippantly and examines the shelves, seeing if there’s anything of value. Erandur calls after him,

“And you’ll have to tell me yours, then.”

“Does it matter?”

“I only think we ought to know each other a little bit better.”

“Why?” Celemir narrows his eyes. Erandur huffs, half-amused,

“I only asked you your name.”

“What do we need to do?” Celemir changes the topic. Erandur takes this in stride,

“We need Vaermina’s Torpor to access the Dreamstride.”

“Right.”

“I can’t quite remember… Um, it’s been several decades.” Erandur rubs the back of his neck,

“It should be in a tall, reddish bottle. I think. That’s what we put the elixirs into.”

Celemir turns from the shelf containing mostly tall, red bottles. Erandur continues, sheepishly,

“And its label should say. If it isn’t labelled, just ignore it. Oh, and don’t open any potions or shake any of them. _Especially_ the blues ones.”

“’Kay.”

Erandur finds the Torpor after an hour of searching the massive, but ruined, laboratory.

“Now, the Torpor’s effects won’t work on me, being a priest of Mara.”

“Which means I have to do it,” Celemir says with an annoyed sigh. He hates this situation. He hates how he wants to trust the priest, but his own mind turns against him, screeching arguments and obscenities. These are things that he does not like to think. They are thoughts unbidden, uncontrolled, and they surge up, boiling over.

He almost can’t focus on Erandur anymore. The thoughts grow too loud, and they become not only sensations, but words.

Celemir refines them like a forger refining crude ore, 

“How do I know?”

“I showed you where in the Dreamstride it said.”

“Along with the effects of it going wrong. I could die.” Celemir stares down at the bottle, wondering why he brought up that concern about dying. 

He doesn’t know how much his life matters to him, having faced battle alone time and time again. A century long passed; he still hasn’t found a purpose for himself in that time.

 _A mercenary who’s lost his way_ , as the others described him. 

_A roaming knight. More of a vagrant, if you ask me,_ others said, thinking he couldn’t hear them with his back turned. It’s accurate, though.

Maybe, that’s why he’s here on the fringes of the Empire and Tamriel, deep in this temple overlooking half-frozen, ancient seas. Maybe, none of this matters, not anymore.

There’s another phrase that could describe him now, one that speaks to the Orcish-blood running hot in his veins. Same blood that finds his heart and keeps it beating.

Celemir blinks. That phrase could be it. 

“Um…?” Erandur stares up at him, concern on his face. Celemir takes the bottle,

“Fuck it.” He chugs down the contents. Erandur murmurs,

“Language…”

The soft reprimand amuses him as he slowly but surely fades. His form shifts, becoming ethereal, and then, nothing.

It fails to surprise him that Thorek and Veren yet live. Erandur, once Casimir, badly tries hiding the slight tremor in his voice. The Vaerminan high priests see through it, spotting the hesitation, and attack at once. Celemir’s crossbow, its bolts laced in silencing poison, take out both, and the fighting ends faster than it began.

Celemir steps over Thorek’s body and tugs another bolt out from Veren’s jugular – a lucky shot. Blood hisses out from the wound onto Celemir’s boots. His boots leave bloody prints behind him as he goes over to where Erandur hangs back, hand over his mouth.

Finally, the priest of Mara collects himself,

“I’m sorry. I just knew them.”

“Casimir, right?”

“That was my name.” Erandur sighs, pulls down his hood, and runs a hand through greying black hair. He smiles, but it’s a sad, pained one, 

“So, you know what happened. What I did.” It only made sense that it had been Casimir that released the Miasma, being so close the temple entrance, and freedom from the cult was just beyond that entrance. This, Celemir doesn't comment on. He only affirms with a quiet, 

“Yes.” Erandur fixes his robes and takes in a deep breath, steeling himself,

“Now then, the Skull.”

He approaches the dais where the twisted staff no longer hides behind a gossamer barrier. The eye sockets of Skull glow red like coals, still some of its power remaining.

Celemir waits, and a voice whispers into his ear, louder than Erandur’s chant in the chamber,

_‘You weren’t wrong to not trust.’_

The words are balm for the anxieties lurking in the back of his mind as much as they are seeds for more.

_‘He wants the Skull for himself. Take it. It will not betray you. Not in the ways others have betrayed you before.’_

The voice, not from the walls nor the Skull, comes within himself. His own mind, as it wont to do, turns again on him. He loads his crossbow. Celemir always knew a traitor when he saw one.

‘ _Do it. I will not betray you.’_

He stalls, finger hovering over the crossbow’s release. Such words are not new to him, and not words to be trusted. Sparse magicka from Erandur's channeling streams past him, its presence brushing bared skin. Magicka in his blood, his being, reaches out.

Warmth leeches into him. This isn’t the magicka given by a Daedra worshipper, nor a deceiver. This is _clean_ magicka, generated only in the heart of hearts of a healer. He’s only felt it a few times, all at the hands of honest priests and clerics.

It shepherds his thoughts away from fears of treachery, and instead, his thoughts narrow in on old memories of a study, a warm hearth, old voices echoing about, being small again and someone, a woman, running her fingers through his hair.

Celemir lowers the crossbow, confused by what he’s remembering. Erandur turns, the Skull now absent from this Plane.

He doesn’t speak of what happened at the bottom of the temple, and the voice that trespassed into his thoughts. Although, they are things need to be said, but his memories of that magicka and its effect on him still bar him.

Erandur transforms the Daedric temple into a sanctuary and shrine. Cleaning it up needs help from a Jarl who needs popularity and relief from his people. Surely, Celemir hasn’t a reason to be here much longer. The Jarl's people have already done enough in clearing the bodies from the temple and repairing damages in the structure. Erandur now tends the banners of Mara brought to Dawnstar from Riften,

“You still haven’t told me your name.”

“It’s Celemir.” Celemir helps the priest hang up the first few due to his height. He doesn’t remember _who_ gave him the name exactly, and it’s one he doesn’t go by often anymore. Celemir can’t even remember the last time someone called him by it…

 _Is that bad?_ , he wonders. Erandur smiles slightly as he says,

“Celemir. It’s a good thing I changed my name, I suppose. Celemir… Casimir. It’d get very confusing.”

“Yeah.” Celemir feels bad for not being good at basic conversations. Erandur’s been carrying this one. In fact, he’s probably been carrying all of them since they met a few weeks ago.

Erandur continues carrying this conversation,

“If I remember the Aldmeris, it has a curious meaning.”

“Hm…” Celemir can’t respond easily. Aldmeris is a language of a people that would prefer him to not exist. Erandur stops unfurling the next banner out of the crate and raises a finger, 

“’ _Bright-lad_ ’, I think is the meaning. An apt name.”

“Sure,” Celemir mumbles, not at all sure how to feel about the remark. He takes the last banner and hangs it up for Erandur. Celemir then remembers himself, and why he came here in the first place.

“I need to get my things.” He’d left most of his weapons here since Erandur had been letting him stay at the sanctuary for free. Erandur’s face naturally falls at that.

“Are you sure? You’re welcome to stay longer.”

“Yes.” His next job involves some conjurers off the coast of Winterhold, and he’ll need everything since he’s going at this alone.

“Well, if you’re leaving, take some of those potions in that crate over there. I hope they’ll help you.” By the shrine and next to the chest where Erandur kept his prayer beads, there is a tiny crate, full of wrapped bottles. Celemir pauses, then turns back to Erandur.

“It’s alright.”

“No, please, take them. As thanks for helping me.”

“Okay.”

Celemir only takes half the potions in the crate and leaves. He hopes he’ll never have to come back to this confusing place, or the confusing mer that lives in it.   
  
  



	4. Shelter

The days are peaceful and quiet within the sanctuary, its halls filled with light and Mara’s warmth. Erandur works through day, and sometimes through the nights as well, but these efforts bring him some measure of relief and meaning.

Erandur tends to everyone who enters as any priest of Mara would, and perhaps better now, the laboratory at the bottom of the temple functions once again. This, a courtesy from the new Jarl, a veteran Legionnaire named Brina Merilis.

He can’t quite say he’s relieved there’s a new Jarl, but his treatment in town has certainly improved. The guards are more cordial, and no longer is he harassed for allowing refugees to shelter within the ancient temple, neither do the Skald’s soldiers encroach on its grounds.

These fresh troops from Cyrodiil offer to escort him back to the temple if he’s caught outside late. He does appreciate them, and they him for more than a few of his patients have been their comrades. With the presence of these soldiers and the Empire’s black and red banners about, the mercenaries and privateers have vanished, seemingly overnight.

Erandur does appreciate the lawfulness of the Empire, but something remains that leaves him uneasy. Perhaps, it’s the number of black and gold robes on the streets, followed closely by armed guard. They ignore him, the Dunmer priest in shabby robes. For now, anyway.

He isn’t naïve enough to think that the Thalmor will ignore his temple forever. He may not be priest of Talos, nor will he ever, but these Thalmor have their orders. The people within those temple halls are the displaced farmers, Stormcloak deserters, and desperate refugees that the Thalmor love to make prey of.

It is on one of these late nights in the temple, gathering up clean linens for the cots, when the front door opens, and Erandur believes his fears are true.

He pauses, eyes straining to make out the figure across the room, and they see Erandur before Erandur can determine whether it’s a Thalmor agent or not.

Candlelight reflects back at him, amber in the eyes of the figure, and he knows who it is. A reprimand for startling him dies in Erandur’s throat when he sees their quarry, wrapped up in their cloak. Celemir says,

“Can you help…?”

“Over here,” Erandur throws down the sheets and guides Celemir over to the clean cots. He gestures for him to lay the person down. The man’s a middle-aged Redguard sailor with white in his beard and grey in his face, breathing shallowly, painfully.

His blood coats the inside of the cloak Celemir wrapped him up in. Erandur grits his teeth, knowing full-well the chances of survival are not good for a man of his age.

Celemir states, “He was the only one alive. I…”

Erandur picks up where Celemir trails off, pats him once on arm. His skin is icy to the touch, having forgone his cloak.

“I’ll take over. You just…”

Celemir, without needing to be told, gets out of Erandur way, and Erandur gets to work.

Everyday Erandur works at this, he becomes more and more aware of the years catching up to him. The ache in his knees and back. Soon, there’ll be a time where he can’t work like this anymore. He hopes Mara calls upon him to leave this world when that time comes because he’ll gladly go.

For now, he busies himself by putting away the implements from the last-minute surgery on the sailor. The man no longer bleeds, and there is a chance he might pull through. If he does, he may be able to answer some questions that Celemir can’t. Erandur places the instruments back inside their cabinets, but the scalpel and needle stay in a sterilizing bath.

His fingers are chapped from constantly being scrubbed down with lye soap, and they sting when he puts salve on them. As he does this, he asks conversationally,

“So, how did you chance upon a shipwreck like that?”

Celemir surprises him with an answer that’s longer than two words,

“Happenstance. Saw some lights out on the water. I water-walked out. What remained of the ship was on fire. The others had drowned already. Thought they were all dead, y’know?” Celemir sighs and gestures at the sailor on the cot across the room,

“Then that poor bastard calls out to me. I grab ‘em up, get ‘em out of the water, and then he says some pirates blew up their ship. This was all before he passed out, of course…”

“Pirates? That can’t be too surprising. This is Dawnstar.”

Dawnstar, before Jarl Merilis booted all out, had been a favorite port among the pirates. Of course, pirates then were referred to as ‘privateers’. Erandur never cared for any of them, no matter if they supported Stormcloak’s cause. They were hardly better than bandits, if not worse.

“He told me one of them was a mage. They blew up the ship,” Celemir then opens his flask with his teeth. Erandur can smell the liquor from the across the table. Spiced rum, he thinks, like the kind from out of Hammerfell.

Erandur runs a hand down his chin, furrowing a brow,

“I’ve heard of such a group, but I’m sure you know more than me about how Jarl Skald employed pirates to attack Imperial trade vessels…”

“Perhaps.”

“So, has the Jarl employed any other mercenaries? To help?”

“Think so, but they’re East Empire Company mercenaries. Fucking hate those guys.”

“ _Language_ ,” Erandur chides him. Celemir rests his head on his hand,

“I’m not splitting the reward with those useless bastards.”

“Celemir,” Erandur says, a warning in his tone. 

“You’re pushing your luck if you’re going at this alone.”

“If I was worried about my luck, would I have helped you clear out this temple?”

He remembers the bluntness of Celemir’s initial refusal to help, and remembering puts a frown Erandur’s face, 

“Pirates and Miasma-addled cultists are quite different from each other. And if one of these pirates is a mage powerful enough to destroy an Imperial trade vessel, who’s to say you’re well-equipped enough to face them?”

“I’ve faced worse odds.” Celemir answers. The cryptic answer leaves Erandur dissatisfied, peeved, but he knows he can’t talk Celemir down. No one can, he figures, not when the man’s stubborn as a mule. Erandur stares down at his hands and the tiny cuts spanning across the tops of his knuckles and the darker purple, chapped skin. 

Patience is what he tells himself, and suddenly, another thought occurs to him as he thinks about himself, just after escaping from the cult.

With no family, no one, he wandered, listless. A void hollowed in his chest those days as he mourned the memories stolen from him, and the family he once had and could no longer remember. This void transformed, ate up his spirits, and drove him onto a path that would’ve taken him to his own end. Would have, if it weren’t for the traveling priest of Mara that found him.

Looking at Celemir now, he knows that there will never be a chance of bringing Celemir into the Faith, but there is something else he can do. Maybe it will be the only thing he could do for Celemir, someone as guarded and distrustful as him.

Before Erandur can broach the conversation, Celemir’s gaze skirts the room, lingers on the sailor breathing shallowly on his cot,

“Well, he’s in good hands. I need to be off.”

“Wait, are you sure? There’s—”

Celemir cuts him off awkwardly, avoiding Erandur’s gaze,

“I have to go.” He stands rigidly, grabs up his things, and heads back out. Erandur sighs, knowing he’ll be back, eventually, but he still worries, more than he should someone barely more than a stranger.

Erandur can’t quite say they’re friends, mostly because of Celemir. When he doesn’t need to be aggressive, he avoids conversation, direct eye contact, and his manners are horrid, to put it mildly. Erandur scratches his beard as he continues to think over this and putting the kettle on.

It isn’t uncharacteristic for mercenaries to spend great lengths of time without interacting to people, especially if they’re like Celemir and work alone. Erandur’s also never seen him in the company of other mercenaries, or anyone for that matter. In some ways, it’s pitiful. In other ways, it’s incredibly dangerous.

When injured on a job, Celemir only has himself to rely on. What if he was hurt somewhere out in the wilderness, and he couldn’t get back to here in time? What then? Erandur scowls at himself as his thoughts loop back to their previous conversation.

Why didn’t he bring this up before Celemir left? If he had just told Celemir this, then maybe… Erandur drums his fingers on the table. Across the room, the sailor coughs, and the cot creaks.

Maybe it is time for some tea.

The next morning Erandur finds an oddity just outside the temple front door. A rune glows where it’d been burned into the stone, hardly discernable from the rest of the old stones, but Erandur felt the magicka’s curl the moment he stepped outside and met the cold.

A Mark of Recall, if Erandur were to guess. Such spells were not uncommon, nor do they require a great deal of expertise to use. He just hasn’t seen anyone place one in some time.

He supposes that it could only be Celemir using one of these and wonders where he’d learned the magic. Erandur had formerly thought him more an Orc than an Altmer, but that raises a point: he doesn’t know that much about him. Some of his patients and the guards he knows better than the mercenary, and yet, they don’t know _him_.

They don’t know he wasn’t always a priest of Mara, nor that Nightcaller Temple had always been his home. Celemir knows these secrets, and Celemir doesn’t care. He stuck around after the temple had been consecrated and helped set up the clinic, not even asking for compensation, but doing it out of his free will. Same could be said for the sailor he painstakingly rescued from a watery grave.

Maybe Erandur doesn’t need to know much more, and maybe there’s something to be seen past the violence Erandur had been introduced to. Something that’s _good_.

Erandur faces the bite of the morning chill a moment longer before heading back inside. Today is not a good day to journey down to Dawnstar, not when another blizzards swarms on the horizon.

By dusk, five days later, the door opens, and Celemir’s form, a form Erandur can now recognize, slips into the antechamber of the temple. He’s hunched forward slightly. Erandur stands, and the pew creaks.

“Celemir…?”

“Ello,” Celemir wheezes back and steadies himself on the pew.

The acrid smell of burnt hair mingles with the greasy, unmistakable stench of seared human flesh. It has caked into Celemir’s clothes, but he hasn’t been burned from what Erandur can tell. Although, there’s something in his eyes. His gaze is dull. Something is wrong.

Erandur puts a hand on Celemir’s arm,

“Why don’t you sit down? You’ve had a long journey, I imagine.”

“Can’t.”

“Why?”

Celemir moves his cloak and reveals the dagger hilt sticking out of his side.

Erandur swallows, having no idea how far the knife went in, but he does know the angle, and it’s not good. He helps Celemir across the rest of the room,

“I’m not going to say I told you so…” He barely manages to get Celemir onto a cot before the man slips out of consciousness. Erandur sighs, gulps down a draught of strength, and gets to work, thinking up a lecture as he does.

Treating the stab wound isn’t easy, but at least the attacker didn’t think to poison the blade. That, he reckons, would’ve killed Celemir.

 _Maybe not_ , he corrects himself. Celemir’s got too many scars. Looking at some of them, Erandur doesn’t want to even imagine how he’s survived this long. One silvery mark crosses over his chest. Another stab wound. For some reason, it makes Erandur feel sickly, even if he’s treating another one now. Because no one can keep living like this. More importantly, no one should be forced to live like this. 

As Erandur’s suturing the wound shut, he finds Celemir watching him with a feverish gaze.

Celemir rambles through even the opium Erandur gave him earlier,

“I killed ‘em. Like I said I would, but he said ‘Wait!’ before I did it.”  
  
Celemir’s breathing hastens. Erandur holds his side so he won’t pop his sutures.

“Celemir, you need to lie still.”

“You think I should’ve waited?”

Erandur drags in a breath between his teeth. Mercy is one of the first edicts of his faith, along with compassion, but the world of a priest is far different than that of mercenary’s. One could say their ideals run in opposite directions, but that didn’t mean these ideas couldn’t intersect.

Erandur finishes the sutures before answering, 

“You doubt you deserved to live more than them?” It's a frame of mind he tries to emulate, to understand. 

“I don’t know. He was a mercenary too, hired up by some Clan in Windhelm.” Celemir drags in another breath,

“Said ‘I have plenty of years left with my family.’ Killed ‘em anyway, but…” Erandur cuts him off gently,

“Sparing him may have not done anything.”  
  
A man in that line of work knew about the risks of the job, and this man, being a pirate, murdered civilians where he could. Erandur couldn't find much sympathy for the dead man, but somehow, Celemir is. 

“Aren't you a priest of Mara?" 

“What I’m saying is: one of you would have died, and whoever survived would’ve continued to perpetuate this cycle of violence, one way or another.”

“So, it doesn’t matter?”

“No, but you sound like you’re wanting an excuse to leave this work behind.” Erandur states. Celemir stares up at the ceiling. Another sigh leaves him, rattling out of his chest, 

“The Orcs, blood kin, call it ‘a good death’. I think that’s what I’m looking for. A good death. I thought I’d get it back there but…. Dying’s surprisingly difficult when you want to.”

“I wish you wouldn’t.” 

Celemir remains silent as he now stares at the stone floors by Erandur’s foot, looking everywhere except at Erandur.  
  
“Why are you doing this?”  
  
Erandur sits forward in the chair by Celemir's bed, 

“What do you mean?”

“Are you just doing this because you want to call in a favor or…”

“A favor?” The sickly feeling from earlier washes over him again. Celemir steals one glance at Erandur, 

“I technically owe you a debt. A blood debt, now.”

“No debts. I’m doing this because I want to. Get some rest, and we’ll talk properly in the morning.” Erandur covers Celemir with a blanket and leaves him so the opium can carry him off to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is based off that one quest where you can help out the east empire company in windhelm but tweaked a little because the mercenaries were kind of useless. so, essentially,... i'm bitter. 
> 
> i hope the commentary about the 'cycle of violence' and everything wasn't too annoying. i originally wrote erandur being in the position to be like 'hey, violence is bad, mkay?' but the guy will throw down at any second to protect your char from harm sooooooo.....
> 
> (celemir is really confused rn i'm sorry if he doesn't make much sense, he's also under the effects of opium so he's just talking...)
> 
> oh! and Thalmor in the next chapter!


	5. Red

Nightmares and dreams flooding through come to die upon waking.  
  
Half-asleep, half-awake, his mind drifts on, where time of events remains irrelevant, and his memories are an ocean of thought. Dreams played back the events that made him who he is now, a hardened cynic. 

But his fading memories differ, showing a reality neither fantastic nor bleak, like the Fall of Taneth…

Ashes borne from mage-fire stream past, brushing against his cheeks. Sweating through his underclothes, his armor bakes him alive where he stands on the battlements with his liege lord, a nobleman whose name Celemir can’t remember, only that he was a damned fool of a man.

Smokes catches in Celemir’s throat and he coughs. The Dominion’s Daedra batter at the gates once again, and the sound deafens like a crack of thunder. He hopes he won’t have to hear the wood breaking, not because he has some delusional hope the city will survive this siege, but because he won’t around to hear it.

“ _You’re staying here.”_

 _“You hear that?!”_ Celemir shouts over the din.

The apartments, precincts, and holdfasts this nobleman owns will burn for a wall of fire swarms in the distance, eating up slums and palaces alike, and the Daedra run rampant through the streets. Their words, their screeches, add to the discord, but below their pitched voices, there is another sound undercutting all of it. A low sonorous, wail of the people, citizens, some fleeing or fighting, trapped behind walls meant to protect them.

_“City’s dying.”_

_“I need you to defend—”_ The nobleman’s guards swarm around, Celemir remains impasse. The Alik’r warriors will defend this city to the last person, but he wasn’t born to these sands. These halls, this city, means nothing to him, and no amount of money or favors could get him to stay any longer. 

_“I’m not about to die for a bunch of empty trade halls.”_

He leaves, and the chaos is punctuated by the insults slung at his back. He remembers one to this day, even if he never knew who said it,

_“Run back to your Thalmor masters then, you motherless Half-Mer.”_

Still, he kept walking away after that, skin having grown thick over the years, but he never went to the Thalmor. He never bothered with them despite the Dominion being more than willing to recruit him before. Something about the principle of it. Maybe that was why the insult stayed with him. 

Funny, he’d never considered himself to be a man of morals. Considering…

The catches of voices draw him out of his mind’s replaying of the events, and he cracks open an eye.

Erandur sits at the table playing a card game with the sailor Celemir rescued. They’re both in good spirits, and because of that, Celemir feels like an intruder looking in. Like he doesn’t belong here.

The sailor cracks a grin,

“Aye, you’ve a fine hand, priest.” Erandur chuckles, and his laugh is warm and light,

“Not my first-time playing Iron Hearts. But here, I can’t eat all of these.” Erandur pours the rest of the ginkgo nuts, what they were gambling over, into a bowl, and they share the snack.

Then comes a knock at the door. A knock that Celemir can actually recognize. Only Altmer knock at doors with four, perfect in rhythmic taps, just above the knob. It’s so the sound won’t carry too far, and for this, it sounds borderline innocuous, nothing like how a guardsman or a marauder would knock, and more like a neighbor asking for a cup of sugar.

“Erandur,” Celemir gets up, head-spinning and side screaming. Erandur does a one-eighty and hurries over, eyes wide,

“Hey, hey. Lay down. You shouldn’t be up at all, in fact.” Erandur steadies him, hands on his arms. Celemir doesn’t want to be either. His sides argues that much, and where the knife went in is a dull ache. His stitches will tear if he’s not careful.

“Let me answer the door.”

“Are you expecting someone?”

“Thalmor.” Celemir murmurs.

“I know, it sounds stupid, but that’s a Thalmor knock. Only Thalmor knock like that. Trust me.”

Erandur exchanges a confused glance with the sailor. The Sailor sighs,

“What in Oblivion would the Thalmor want at this hour?”

“Information.” Celemir states flatly. Erandur stares at the entry leading down into the temple’s citadel where the rest of the refugees remain sheltered. Some of whom they both know are Talos worshippers.

“Alright, Celemir go answer the door, then. See if you can… While I… Habd?” Erandur asks the Sailor, who gets up from the table. They go towards the back and raise Mara’s bannisters to hide the entry. Celemir answers the door, wearing only his braies. It’s a strategy he’s used before, and without fail, the Justiciar and her soldiers cut their eyes away immediately. One of the soldiers swears under his breath.

“Hiya,” Celemir says casually to the Justiciar. She finally tears her gaze away from the ground and clears her throat.

“Good evening.” She tries looking past Celemir. Celemir catches her eye, then says apologetically, 

“Evening, Justiciar, gentlemen. ‘fraid you caught me at a bad time. Mind if I make myself presentable…?”

“Please, that would be most appreciated,” the Justiciar says, struggling to even look at him. Celemir shuts the door and stalks across the room. Erandur meets him halfway, whispering,

“What did they say?”

“I made them uncomfortable and bought us some more time. Do you have everything…?” Erandur turns to where Habd hangs the last banner, and then back to Celemir, he motions at the nightstand by the bed, where a bundle of clothes lay.

“Go put on those then, I think they’re your size.”

Celemir dresses in a pair of thick wool pants and socks, only the jerkin doesn’t fit, but the undershirt does. With his boots on, and now a bit warmer, Celemir answers the door again. Behind him, Erandur and Habd resume their game of cards, chatting on as before.

When he answers the door again, the Thalmor stares him dead in the face, getting a good look at him, and deadpans,

“Do you always meet potential employers almost naked?”

“Depends.” Celemir humors her, and then realizes what she just said.

_Potential employer._

He then considers how he’ll word the rejection. Although, he isn’t in much of position to reject work since his major source of income, Jarl Skald, remains in exile.

The Justiciar is an older woman, just on the cusp of being middle-aged, but it’s hard placing an Altmer’s age. She has a small, round face, silvery hair, large green eyes that squint up at him, and the pair of spectacles sitting on the bridge of her nose reflect back the temple’s candlelight. 

“You are _him_. I was expecting… More teeth?”

Celemir grits his molars together at that because his teeth, his tusks in particular, are always the first thing Altmer think to comment on, and he always thinks about knocking _their_ teeth out when they mention it.

He would, but he needs money.

“Well, guards.” She turns to the two soldiers,

“You stay here. I’m going to have a quick word with him.”

She leads him to the one of the cliffs overlooking Dawnstar, and there, they have some semblance of privacy. Celemir still watches the guards of the corner of his eye. He doesn’t trust that they won’t rush the temple while he’s out here.

“Let me preface, I’m a big fan.”

Celemir blinks at that, then checks the guards again. They remain. Neither have moved an inch.

“I saw you in Solitude last, in the High King’s one-hundred-man melee, I believe. Before then, I saw you in High Rock, where you won another tournament, winning as the best swordsman, I believe?” Celemir nods when she looks to him for confirmation. The Justiciar continues,

“And before then, I saw you in Taneth, leaving the city. An intelligent decision. I would’ve hated to meet you for the first time on the battlefield. But I digress, I’m prone to fawning…” With her fingertip, she conjures a small flame and lights her pipe. A curl of sweet smoke hits him,

“I understand the Dominion has reached out to you before for employment.”

“I’m not smart enough to be a spy,” Celemir answers honestly. The Justiciar playfully inclines her head at that comment,

“So, you say, but I’m not here for that.” She blows a smoke ring, 

“I’m here for something more personal. What do you know about the Oblivion Crisis?”

Celemir thinks back the larger-than-life stories his grandmother told him,

“A Tower fell, devastated the people. The Thalmor saved everyone from damnation.”

“Yes… But there’s more. What do you know about the Mythic Dawn?”

“They opened the Gates.” Celemir dredges up more and more of the stories, and suddenly, an uncomfortable, anxious feeling washes over him. He doesn’t know why.

The Justiciar stares down at Dawnstar, and a hate created from more than decades of resentment shows in her eyes. It is an icy well, steeped over the centuries, never forgotten nor relinquished. It is a breed of hate that only Elves have.

Celemir tenses up to fight a shiver. She breathes, the smoke seeps from her mouth and nostrils, 

“I may not look it, but my father died closing one of those Gates. His death left my family destitute for ages, and only now, am I able to redeem them. And here, in this rat spit, dreadful town, there sits a ‘museum’ _honoring_ those people who got my father killed and devastated my family. And this… This _animal_ sells out its own kind, and I can’t do anything about it. The Jarl’s forbidden us, but you…”

Her breathing rate picks up, close to panting, and her pupils are wide and wild. She turns to Celemir,

“I don’t care how much it costs. I want you to destroy it. Burn it to the ground, kill the owner and destroy it. Destroy it all.”  
  
The enthusiasm in her voice nears maniacal, but in some ways, Celemir understands. He remembers raising the dead, and the collected, weaponized hate that helps him do it. He glances at the building, knowing the exact one, and the crimson, gold banners fluttering by the front.

“I can have it done within a fortnight.”

She takes a long, hungry look at him, appraising him in a way Celemir hates,

“You really are a cut above the rest.”

And as he retreats back into the temple, their business finished for now, he doesn’t know if he just hates the Justiciar for seeing him this way, or he just hates himself more for allowing it— letting himself be an implement, a living weapon for the wills of others, never having a will of his own. He’s always been this way.

It’s the consequence of the reputation that he has built over decades, and the reputation he wears like his armor still binds him. It’s all most see him as, and he used to not care about it. But now? Now, it’s wearing him down, getting too heavy. And so, a weariness with the world falls upon him as violence has taken too much, and too little else abides. He has to end this soon. Erandur upon seeing him, sends him a concerned, searching look, but Celemir can’t bring himself to meet his eye.

He drinks some water and goes back to bed. This time, his sleep is dreamless, and now drifting off again, he hopes his death will be like this.

The lad drops to the floor with a thump of his knees hitting the floorboards, but besides that, nothing. Celemir wipes his hands on the Mythic Dawn banner. Snapping somebody’s neck always leaves his hands feeling dirty, and as he does, he notices the dagger scabbard in the display case. He steals its key from the corpse and pops the display open.

In his bare hands, it’s a brutal thing: dark metal inscribed with the sigil of Oblivion, of Lord Mehrunes Dagon, and the decorations on the scabbard, not quite steel, press against the thick callouses of his palms. Only a little more force, the ends of the scabbard would happily bite into his flesh. This is a piece of the Mehrunes Razor without a shred of doubt, and every part of him screams for him to give this over to Erandur, so he can banish it back to Oblivion.  
  
Only one big problem with this: Erandur thinks that Celemir is in Whiterun, tracking down a group of vigilante werewolf hunters, and not, say, here in Dawnstar murdering a museum curator. 

It was the lie Celemir told everyone, and the Recall rune can get him back to Whiterun in seconds, completing his alibi for what will happen next. He holds onto the scabbard. Surely, he could find someone else who could banish it? It would be reckless leaving it here, but so is holding onto it. He’ll find a place for it. Somewhere well hidden. 

Dagger-scabbard in hand, he pours pitch onto the corpse, bedding, bookshelves, and banners, and with a snap of his fingers, the fire cloaks the room, soon to consume the entire house. He won't be here to witness it. 

The Rune of Recall, inscribed on a boulder somewhere in northern Whiterun’s tundra, activates.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i feel annoying for updating twice in one week, but i had this one in the works for a while and wanted to get it out. hopefully, the writing conveyed that celemir feels trapped by the line of work he's in/the reputation he has among people/the cycle of violence he's been married to almost all of his life :s 
> 
> next chapter, we have erandur chipping at celemir's walls a bit more, and celemir (somewhat) concealing he's murdered someone and that's he's murdered many times before. 
> 
> i'm trying to avoid 'bad but sad' archetype for morally ambiguous chars but i'm still figuring out how to write characters altogether :x


	6. Winter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Erandur with a flask! What will he do?!

_Why didn’t he stay another day longer?_ Erandur wonders, anxieties cropping up again. Stab wounds never mend easily, even with the help and hinder of magic, and he pictures in his mind Celemir’s wound tearing open again. Blood stains the snow, and flesh squelches before tearing like sinew. The werewolf hunter raises their axe high to take a head…

“Father, I honestly think you worry too much,” Habd comments from where he sits, warming his hands by the fire. Erandur smiles briefly at the comment, acknowledging it, but not feeling a lick better. At least Habd has the good sense to rest when he should.

It feels strange, befriending one of his former patients, but the man’s help around the temple has been indispensable. The older sailor had been his vessel’s quartermaster, and he had been well-loved by the other sailors for his advice won only by years upon years of experience out at sea. Being quartermaster put him in the position many times to bargain for the crew’s wages, lest the sailors mutiny against the captain. 

This ability to talk to people that kept the rest of the temple’s inhabitants at ease, especially after the Thalmor’s brief visit. Many, especially those fleeing Thalmor persecution, had been near hysterics when they learned what transpired just above their heads.

Celemir had told him that the Thalmor ‘wouldn’t be bothering them anymore’ before taking up that bounty from Jarl Merilis. His word remained true, but the people had their anxieties…

“I suppose, I feel somewhat responsible for him. I don’t know why, but I do.”

“I heard Celemir’s the one who helped you clear out the temple, back when those Daedra worshippers lived ‘ere.”

“He was.”

“Certain experiences bind you to someone. Especially difficult ones.” Habd’s eyes grow wistful for a moment, and then, he stands,

“You know anything about that lighthouse just outside of town?”

“It’s been abandoned for some time, but I think the Jarl’s been trying to get someone to…” Erandur trails off, figuring out just why Habd asked. 

“Are you planning to take up there?”

Part of him is glad, knowing that Habd will be in the area, but the wistful look in the sailor's eyes remain.

“Been thinkin’ about it. I’m not exactly a spring chicken anymore, and my wife’s always worried sick about me. I just about proved her worst fears true this trip ‘round. I’d also been thinkin’ about getting them out of Solitude. Maybe teach Manni and Sudi how to sail…” Habd then smiles sadly. With that sad twist of his mouth, he explains the heart of the matter,

“My children haven’t exactly forgiven me for being away at sea for so long. Being away from them, I mean.”

“Maybe you’ll have more time with them? If you keep the lighthouse?”

“Aye, I reckon so. Patching up things won’t be easy, but it’s now or never. They’re getting older… I don’t know if I can do it, to be honest with you, Father.”

“But you’ll never know if you never try.” Erandur supplies, and the remark earns him a nod from Habd. He hopes it gives the man some solace.

His own family, not the cult of Vaermina, remains a distant blur somewhere in the back of Erandur’s mind. First memories, as the head priests described them, could not be removed by any incantation nor ritual, but everything else that the cult could take? Gone.

He likes to think that he could have moved on from these losses. Maybe he could’ve started a family of his as priests of Mara are not barred from marrying, but the concept had little appeal to him. The romantic and potentially sexual aspects of it dissuaded him completely.

For what relationships and pleasures within that were, they were collected like prized fruits during a summer harvest. Something to be used, not enjoyed. For experiences were the sacrifices given to satiate Vaermina’s hunger and it was not for their selfish desires. Giving up experiences were the first steps to detachment, and then…

Erandur blinks hard, cutting off the thought. He tries to think of a comforting psalm instead and stares into his Lady’s face. He doesn’t know why Mara chose him, sending him that vision of warmth and love. A mother’s love. Something once stolen from him, now returned. 

Days roll by. Erandur puts in a good word for Habd when the man petitions the Jarl for possession of the nearby lighthouse, and once its granted, the man soon departs, making the place a home for his family soon to join him. Erandur helps Dawnstar where he can, and much of that help is also petitioning the Jarl for supplies.

Jarl Merilis, proving herself wiser than Skald, is more than happy to provide it. Providing relief to the impoverished not only establishes her rapport with the people, but it also keeps the desperate from taking up outlawry.

But just in the instance of outlaws, an escort of Imperial soldiers guide the cart of said supplies up the snowy hills to the temple. Erandur follows close behind, and rear guard have closed ranks around him, keeping him safe.

Strange, Erandur’s beginning to know them by name, as they already know him. A Dunmeri woman, the captain on horseback, raises her hand and signals the escort to a gentle halt.

“Identify yourself,” she shouts over the wind. And in the gloom ahead, Celemir dismounts his horse and approaches, wrapped up in the cloak essentially grafted to his body. Erandur sighs in relief.

_He’s alright._

He quickly identifies Celemir to the captain, and the soldiers relax their guard but only a hair. Celemir quietly rides alongside them, slumping the saddle from exhaustion. Erandur has a hundred and one questions, but he won’t ask them while they have audience.

On Celemir’s horse, Erandur notices one thing. That pale bag dangling from the saddle. Crimson stains through the bottom leaking through, leaving droplets of red in the snow. He’d forgotten in his relief why Celemir left ten days ago. Celemir pulls away from the escort, headed for the Jarl’s longhouse instead.

Later that evening, he returns. Erandur finds him sitting on a pew before Mara, staring at her countenance with an unreadable expression.

“I hope you stabled that horse down at the inn. It’s going to be awfully cold tonight.”

“I did.” Celemir answers simply.

Erandur had never seen him with that horse before, so he could only assume that the horse was taken. _Perhaps_ bought. He doubts the journey to Whiterun for a horse would be worth the extra hundred leagues, but traveling by horse would explain how he got back so quickly…

And yet, it also doesn’t.

If he hadn’t left with the horse, then the journey into Whiterun should have been a good three weeks in Dawnstar’s current weather conditions. Unless, he found the horse on the road, but that was even more unlikely. A merchant train wouldn’t sell a good horse like that on the road between holds. 

Maybe he stopped in town before leaving in bought himself a horse there? That made sense. Whiterun is still a ways away.

“I see you got your alms from the Jarl.” Celemir changes the subject. Erandur settles down next to him on the pew,

“The additions to the temple’s food stores will keep many from going hungry this winter.” He, along with some volunteers, had carefully distributed it amongst the refugees, and still, Erandur fears that it won’t be enough.

There’s a knowing look in Celemir’s eye when he says,

“I have extra money, if you need it.”

Erandur knows where that money came just as well as Celemir knows who he killed to get it. He just nods, not accepting nor denying the money.

“Who were they?”

“Werewolf hunters gone rogue. I think they killed the wrong person and claimed they were a werewolf after. Sometimes, hunters do that. Kill the wrong person and then claim they’re some kind of monster.”

“You’ve done this before.”

“It’s this group called the Silver Hand. They hunt were-beasts, or as I said, claim to.” Celemir shrugs a shoulder,

“But I dunno, I’d rather kill someone suspected of being a werewolf than actually fight a werewolf. You never really know if someone’s one until they turn.”

“Werewolves aren’t as common as they used to be. Thankfully.”

It’d been long since he’d heard stories from outlying villages about a werewolf mauling. Most weren’t even werewolves half the time, only starved wolves and the occasional snow bear. Deaths like those still paled in compared to the devastation a werewolf left in its hungering rage.

Celemir doesn’t say anything to that. Not at first. His amber eyes are slightly wide as he recalls with a far-off look,

“But I found werewolf hides in their base. As in… They skinned them. I mean, werewolves are still people, right?”

“Without a cure, most reach a state where they can’t come back to themselves. Consumed by the curse, as it were. I’d more willing to call them victims. I doubt they’ve asked to become this, but I also doubt the hunters wanted that life for themselves. Consumed by contempt.”

Celemir sighs, unsatisfied by the answer, but asks,

“Would you say it’s a bad thing to kill them then? For the hunters to kill the werewolves, I mean.”

“The werewolves, if they were even werewolves, have the potential of hurting someone. Many, even. But I’d rather try and help them. Cure them, if I could.”

“So, killing them is wrong?”

“Perhaps. I’m not exactly one who can judge a person for killing. It isn’t my place.” It also makes him a hypocrite if he did, but Erandur leaves this out.

“This is a lot like our conversation when you came back from killing those pirates.”

“I don’t remember it.”

Erandur has gotten good at telling when people lie, including people as straight-faced as Celemir. He doesn’t question it. If he doesn’t want to talk about it, Erandur can understand. Celemir doesn’t let himself be vulnerable.

Erandur points to it and the truth of the matter,

“You’re still looking for a way out.” After a long pause, Celemir finally admits,

“Yeah, I am.”

“I never asked if you planned on wintering here in Dawnstar, but you’re welcome to stay.”

“Okay.”

And so, Celemir does.

Winter strikes hard in the Pale, as it is always wont to do, but this year, ataxia stole in with the chill.

(They thought some of the blankets donated to the Temple had been safe, but as it turns out, they hadn’t burned them soon enough. Quarantining in the temple proved a hellish nightmare).

Celemir became skittish when people fell ill and braved the ice fields to get help from the College of Winterhold. He returned with a healer and her apprentices. Together, Erandur included, nipped the outbreak in the bud, and no one died.

Then, once of the worst winter had passed, a ship from Hammerfell came and most of the refugees got aboard, to leave the province altogether, but a few stayed, taking up work in Dawnstar’s mines and docks. Without the curse laying over, work and people thriving under the new Jarl’s leadership, it seemed the town of Dawnstar no longer had such a bleak, gloomy shadow draped over it.

As a port town, it could continue thrive in due time. This leaves Erandur nostalgic for the bright, idealized Dawnstar of his youth. He knows that this Dawnstar was never real, but rather, it exists where his memories try to fill gaps.

This Dawnstar, a little less than perfect, suits him just fine. 

“You will not believe what I heard in town today,” Celemir announces once he’s through the front door.

He easily puts the stack of crates onto the floor, despite their combined weight, and the contents inside jingle together. That had to be his alchemy supplies. He’d ordered them several months back from a glassmaker in Solitude. Erandur rises from his chair,

“What’s that?”

“A dragon attacked some village south of Whiterun.”

“A dragon?”

“I know it’s just a rumor, but I thought it was interesting.”

Erandur hands Celemir a crowbar, and Celemir pries open the crates for Erandur. In the hay, wrapped in cloth, are the artisanal glass implements; alembic, calcinator, retort, and vials. There’s an added spark of magicka where the glass has been tempered with by enchantment.

Erandur comments while he inspects the glassware for any cracks,

“There’s a lot of rumors about dragons these days.”

“Well, I won’t believe that there’s any until someone pays me to kill one.”

“You wouldn’t actually…”

“It’d have practically to be a king’s ransom. So, no worries there.” Celemir’s smile is shy thing, crooked but infectious. Erandur smiles despite himself.

The months had Celemir’s true personality beginning to shine through. He did have a sense of humor, albeit a very dry one, and his occasional acts of altruism belied his aloof front.

Most of the time, like now, Celemir drifts closer. He doesn’t flinch away when Erandur reaches out to touch him. Erandur considers all of these small victories behind the biggest one: getting him to stop working as a mercenary.

But sometimes, Erandur isn’t entirely sure he has truly stopped. Celemir always trains to keep himself fighting-fit. When Erandur asks about it, Celemir mentions that _somebody_ has to keep the temple safe from the occasional frost troll. Erandur appreciates the sentiment. He still fears that one day Celemir will get an offer from the Jarl that he simply can’t refuse, and that he’ll never come back home again.

 _Home_.

“Well…” Celemir brushes straw off his knees as he stands, 

“I’ll go make myself useful and split some wood. It’s gonna be cold tonight.” Erandur thinks to mention,

“I had your wood axe sharpened the other day. It’s by the hearth.” Celemir seems taken aback by it then mumbles,

“Thanks.”

He grabs up it and heads back outside. Celemir isn’t used to Erandur doing things for him. As in, he expected Erandur to exact something in return for favors, but at least now, he doesn’t deny help or question Erandur’s motives, which is nice.

While Celemir is gone, he busies himself by setting up the laboratory once again and imagines what he’ll be able to do now, fully-equipped, but it wouldn’t be medicine nor tonic that Erandur first brews.

Alchemy, seen hardly different than herbalism or thaumaturgy, has a property about it that makes it just as dangerous as any branch of magic: chaos.

All it takes for an elixir to become a deadly poison is often one ingredient, too many stirs, too much time placed into the batch. In many ways, Erandur has thought of it like cooking, only with higher stakes if he messes up, but the Cult, with their many harsh lessons, pushed him towards perfection.

That is ultimately what his alchemy embodies today, but the visitors in the hall do not know this.

Erandur enters the antechamber to find three people. They’re all humans.

The blue-steel of their decorative arms and plate armor gleam in the soft candlelight. They all rise once Erandur enters the room, and he suddenly becomes aware of the fact that Celemir is outside, cutting more wood. His armor, crossbow, and axe lie near the bottom of the temple where he sleeps at night. 

Erandur does not reveal this when he calmly asks,

“May I help you?”

“Yes, Father.” One of them, the Breton, answers with a polite nod of his head. He has the brogue of man from High Rock, and the many lines on his face stretch and shrink as he speaks,

“Please allow me to introduce myself and company, as we have shown up without proper notice like brigands. I pray you will forgive us for this trespass.”

With such courtly speech, Erandur can only assume that these three, with their fine arms, are knights of some kind. Or, they are exceptionally polite mercenaries, but Erandur, knowing a certain mercenary, doubts that.

“Certainly. Please, make yourself welcome in this sanctuary of Mara.”

“Thank you.” The Breton turns to his companions,

“These are my squires, Renoir and Halwart, and I am Gaspard, of Daggerfall.”

He leaves out his titles. Intentionally. Erandur grinds teeth together. He doesn’t know much about formal conduct, but he has a hunch that Gaspard should have mentioned his titles. And if he’s a knight of _Daggerfall_ why is he all the way out here in Skyrim?

“To whom have you pledged fealty to?” Erandur inquires.

“Why, the King of Daggerfall, of course, but the head of our order is a close friend of mine, Lady Elyse Whitemane.” He pauses, watching Erandur for a moment, looking to see if Erandur recognizes this name, but Erandur doesn’t feign to know these things.

“I’m afraid I’m but a lowly priest. Please forgive my ignorance, my lords.” He inclines his head slightly. The company before doesn’t take too much offense, if any. Gaspard draws in a deep breath,

“You see, for the matters at hand, I must be direct: my company and I are mage-hunters, and we have reason to believe a very, _very_ dangerous individual has taken up inhabitance here, perhaps under a false name and pretenses?” 

“Mara guard and keep me,” Erandur feigns concern, but he already knows who they’re talking about. Still, the mage-hunters buy his act. 

“And Lady Elyse has demanded that we capture and deliver him to her for summary execution in the name of King.”

“Dare I ask: what crimes?”

“We suspect he was the one behind the Newgate Murders, under orders of Lady Prestor, who is currently being tried for high treason. She was Celemir’s liege lord, whom…”

Erandur stops listening after this, and he doesn’t have to feign shock. As it grabs hold of him, he considers fleetingly: they may not be telling truth. His gaze rounds on the three again. They know he doesn’t about any of these people or matters. 

He is just a lowly priest, but he’s not foolish enough to take their word, even if they are knights. Something is wrong here. Something he doesn’t know, surely.

Surely, Celemir can’t be the murderer, but he’s killed time and time again, who’s to say that those killings weren’t murders also?

Does that make him much different than Erandur, one who has killed time and time again? The one who conducted ceremonies to steal memories from children? The one whose concoctions siphoned the memories out of sacrifices until nothing remained of them but a husk of person?

And was it not him who released the Miasma meant to eventually kill everyone in the temple, himself included? Is that not murder? Surely…

There are other unspeakable acts that Erandur only remembers doing, not much worse than releasing the Miasma, but still, he has not been tried for his actions. Only, the sentence passed on him was a lifetime of guilt.

In face of these moral consternations, he can only consider that he is a priest, and this is a sanctuary of Mara. For this, he cannot grant these mage-hunters their quarry. He has to protect Celemir, but how? He knows that he isn’t much of a match for these three. Not in melee and not by spell either.

Rather, something boils down at the bottom of the temple, where his laboratory fumes and spits of vapors into the cold air, sending it up into the ancient vents. Erandur stutters,

“I… I need a moment. I had no idea.”

The knights grants him this. Erandur stumbles down the stairs, holding onto the walls as he goes. His movements are jerky, automatic.

_What is he doing?_

He should be telling these knights everything he knows, but he can’t convince himself to turn around and do that, not with Celemir on the line. Whether Celemir has murdered or not, Erandur decides, is a matter that the Gods can handle, not for him and other mortals to decide, imperfect as they all are.

He finds in his laboratory, boiling away in the alembic, an elixir. Only, it’s half-finished. Erandur hadn’t put in the catalyst yet, but now, he never will. He glances at the doorway once. No one has followed him down, but he also doubts they’ll understand what exactly he’s doing.

An artisanal alchemist would balk, not at only the relative risk of what he’s doing, but also at the ethics of it. He drops the shredded herbs into the mixture. Magicka roils off the liquid’s surface, slowly turning it into a roiling gossamer.

Erandur, hands gloved, takes the potion off the heat and stoppers up the vapors before they can escape the vial. The vapors inside swirl about like fog. Perfect for his purposes.

Back at the antechamber, Erandur pauses in the doorway. Like so many years ago, he left releasing a Miasma. Funny how decades later he would doing something of the same.

He throws the vial before the knights can react and covers his mouth and nose. As the vapors disperse, there’s coughing and some shouting before silence closes over the room again. The concoction now a compulsion takes root, and it possesses the minds of the individuals fallen victim to it.   
  
The knights stare at Erandur, blankly, not a thought in their minds. Erandur states,

“You came here searching for Celemir, but you did not find him anywhere. You will go back home and tell your lords such, and _you will never come back_.” 

The knights shuffle out of the temple. He doesn’t mind the door, as the vapor needs more time to filter out. Unlike the laboratory, there are no vents in this room.

For now, he waits for Celemir to get back, heart hammering in his chest. The icon of Mara catches his eye from where he stands, and thus, he begins his penances for forgiveness once more.

Not long after, Celemir returns with firewood in tow, and at Erandur’s face, he throws it down and hurries over.

“What happened? Raiders? Brigands…?”

“No, nothing of the sort. Quite the opposite of brigands, I’d say.” There is no energy in Erandur’s voice. His knees are sore from how long he knelt, supplicant to Mara. The penances still ring in his mind.

“Huh?”

“Knights.”

“Oh.” Celemir loses the color in his face. Erandur continues,

“Knights of Daggerfall, to be specific.”

“Knights of the Dragon.” Celemir reiterates,

“The Newgate murders.”

“Yes. They were here about that. Supposed to bring you in…” Erandur continues, his voice losing more and more strength as went on. What if Celemir had been responsible for those murders? Those knights could have been telling the truth, and he’s protecting a murderer from the headsman’s axe. What kind of priest is he?

Celemir rubs the back of his neck as he thinks,

“Then, that probably means Whitemane’s looking for a scapegoat because the Knights were here. Then _that_ means Prestor said something which…” Celemir stops himself. He adds softly,

“Which means, ultimately, you didn’t tell them.”

“I didn’t know if they were telling the truth. I know I’ve killed more than I care to admit, but Celemir, be honest with me: were you responsible for those murders at Newgate?”

“Not those.”

“ _Not those?!_ ”

“Not who they’re thinking of,” Celemir explains. They go over to the table and chairs at the back of the room. Once Celemir sits down, he gestures at the door across the chamber, and his telekinesis slams it shut. Content in their isolation, newly lit candles haloing Mara’s face, Erandur gains courage to say,

“Tell me everything.”

And so, Celemir does.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter is slightly longer than usual, and I have to end things here for now. I didn't want to wind up with a 8k long chapter because that would be A Lot :( 
> 
> (Whitemane and Prestor are just such a good names. I had to steal them from WoW lmao). 
> 
> Next chapter will kind of be about Daggerfall's tumultuous political climate, and Celemir's own involvement in the Newgate murders. We'll also see some more about Erandur's past as a Vaerminian cultist :)! 
> 
> Till then <3!


	7. Moving On

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Celemir becomes self-aware

_He knows._

The thought is a voice that carries over the panicked stream of thoughts coursing through Celemir’s mind where he sits.

Erandur doesn’t know about what happened to the other people who once knew. Dead men tell no tales, and it’s Celemir’s usual policy when people are too smart for their own good. But he would never hurt Erandur, and Erandur would never tell any tales. He hadn’t. He won’t.

Celemir settles in his chair, not feeling at ease in the slightest, 

“It’s simple, really. People think I committed murders in a siege I wasn’t even in.”

“Then why you?” Erandur’s eyes are the color of congealed blood in the low light. Still piercing and bright, they hide the thoughts in the back of his head.

Had he already judged Celemir a murderer? More importantly, if he had, did he even care?

Celemir inclines his head slightly, 

“Why do you think people call me ‘the Red’?”

Erandur gives him a look for answering a question with another question. Celemir says,

"I have a particular reputation. You know of it."  
  
"I do. Somewhat."

There’s something in the press of Erandur’s gaze that makes Celemir want to come forward and drop everything at the table. They are burdens latching on like summer ticks. He’d rather be free of them, poisonous as they are, but he’d never realized he’d ever been carrying them around with him.

The momentum of constantly moving from place to place, city to city, province to province, left him little time to stop and consider his own violence, but stagnant here, unmoving, staring a priest in the face and confessing his deeds, he realizes this weight.

His eyes meet those caught in the grain of the table’s wood planks. Easier to stare into those than ones that have the presence of a conscience behind them. Nails catch on the table-surface, cutting into the flesh. He wishes it were his own. 

“No, I didn’t kill them. Didn’t see even ‘em. Prestor gave the orders, not to me, but to…” Celemir holds the breath in his chest, and there’s a tremble in his hands. The scars and nicks covering them ache in the temple’s chill.

“Was… T’was a squabble over lands between. The Thalmor didn’t touch High Rock in the War, but they sure as hell sowed as much discord as they could.”

Like everywhere else across High Rock, Prestor’s vassals had taken the side of the Thalmor, seduced by false promises of power from the elves.

Lady Prestor did not appreciate the Thalmor’s meddling. She called her banners, her still-loyal vassals, and marched. Celemir had been left behind to protect her keep, and more specifically, to guard her ward, Anduin.

Two slow, agonizing months went by before Prestor’s battle-mages tore down the front gates. Wild heat and spilt blood painted the citadel red, and no one, not even the lowliest servants, survived.

Or rather, that’s how the stories go, but he’s seen the ramparts and the blackened bodies impaled from them.

“Prestor, once inside in the keep, orders…” The name catches in Celemir’s throat, but he doesn’t know why. It strangles his voice, 

“ _Caliban_ to kill the rest of the family. Eliminate the house root and stem…” 

_Caliban..._   
  
The man who had been one of the first and only people Celemir ever considered a ‘friend’. They'd met when Celemir was just starting out as a mercenary. How old was he again? His tusks were just little stubs back then. Little scamp teeth, Caliban called them. Well, that was up until Celemir was about a head or two taller than him, and those 'little teeth' grew into sharp tusks. The older chevalier and he had worked together, winning tourney after tourney.   
  
Lady Prestor, impressed by their meddle, brought them into her service, and that's where everything went downhill. Sometimes, Celemir wonders how their lives would've been if Caliban and he decided that tourneys were good enough for them, if they would still be working together. But in his heart of his hearts, he knows the answer.   
  
Erandur drags him back into the present, 

“The family?” 

“Including the children.” Celemir swallows. His guts churning, he mumbles,

“And a babe in the cradle.”

Erandur stays silent. Celemir closes his eyes and covers his face with his hands.

“I got Caliban after that… I…”

Gods, he could picture it perfectly.

The retreat through the marshes, Caliban’s horse screaming once it’d been speared through the stomach. The crash of armor and undergrowth.

Caliban, splashes and sputters in the marsh waters, trying to get the dead animal’s weight off his leg. Celemir kills their pursuers, and Caliban, realizing he’s safe, looks up at Celemir. His eyes shine with gratitude. He cracks an inside joke and asks if Celemir would help him up since he’d broken his leg from the bad fall. No, he asks but completely expects Celemir to help him up.

And Celemir would have, he doesn’t. Instead, he puts a crossbow bolt through Caliban’s eye and out the back of his skull, but that wasn’t what bothered him. It was an easy way to kill someone and even easier to explain away. This wasn't what kept Celemir up at night.  
  
His thoughts always trail back to the image of a ruined, smoking keep, a dilapidated throne room, shattered windows behind, and the assemblage inside.  
  
Lady Prestor leans and whispers into a figure's ear, and that person nods once, acknowledging the orders. They take their soldiers with them and set a course of the family's quarters. That figure could've been some lowly infantryman, some page, or a battle-mage, or a mage-hunter. Maybe there was no mysterious. Maybe it was Prestor herself who killed the children.   
  
It could’ve been anyone, but word went around it was Caliban, the knight Prestor took with her as a front-line bodyguard, and when Celemir had thought the man had done it, disgusted that he would harm a child, Celemir didn’t even think. He acted. He always justified himself by thinking Caliban had likely been the killer, and that he shouldn’t worry himself over the little details. Somehow that justification feels so flimsy. Weak. 

What’d been roiling in his veins from the moment Erandur mentioned ‘Newgate’ boils over past what he can repress, and it scorches him, consuming him like fire to paper. 

“Celemir…?”

Concern hangs in Erandur’s voice, and Celemir realizes he had been sitting there for an unknown amount of time, silent, staring at his hands. The rest of the words tumble out of him like dead weights, 

“They were war crimes, if there were ever such a thing. You see, the vassal’s wards had been killed too, and those children happened to be Whitemane’s cousins.”

Regardless of the other children murdered, the court would only care if it was Whitemane’s ilk murdered, but not the rest of family, not the children whose only crime was for the blood in their veins.

_Where was the justice for that?_

“I wasn’t _there_.” Celemir repeats, saying it not to contest his own innocence. Because if he had been, he would’ve known for certain, but maybe he’d be dead too and then maybe—

“It’s alright.” Erandur murmurs. Celemir clenches and unclenches his hands, and the sensation feels mechanical, like the clicking crank of a crossbow’s lever drawing back. 

His world feels trapping, as if walls are seconds from falling down and crushing him. Perhaps life is just a trap. A cage, even. Something that he wants to escape.

His head becomes light. The floor wobbles, churning like ocean waves.

He doesn’t know how long it is until Erandur finally walks over. He lays a hand on Celemir’s shoulder,

“It wasn’t you. It’s alright.”

He doesn't answer, and neither accepts the one given.

No more knights come looking for Celemir.

Dawnstar’s court wizard, garbed in a blue and yellow, shows up instead, announced by a quiet knock on the temple doors. Erandur ushers her inside. The bright, blinding white of the afternoon slips inside with the wizard in tow. 

“I hope you don’t mind my visiting at this hour, Father,” the court wizard says as she shakes the snow from her cloak. Erandur takes her cloak for her and hangs it up,

“Oh, no worries. I was just about to put the kettle on. Please, come warm yourself by the fire.”

Celemir strands from where he crouched by the hearth and gives the wizard room. Last night’s conversation still rings in his ears, and his thoughts assume the worst.

Madena, the court wizard, and him have never been on friendly terms, but neither were they outright hostile towards each other. Celemir simply did the Jarl’s work that Madena never wanted to do. Sometimes, when speaking with the Jarl’s steward for his payment, he’d catch her watching him, her dark eyes never quite giving anything away. Just like now.

“It’s quite a place you’ve made for yourselves here.” She murmurs and pulls down her hood. Her ears, although human, end in points.

Her weathered face, twinged slightly red from the cold, belies her age, and yet, she hasn’t the figure of an older woman. She’s too thin, haunted, and grey skin matches the circles under her eyes. He almost pities her but knows better than that.

Madena warms her spidery hands by the hearth.

“It’s been some time since the Jarl saw either of you. I came to make sure everything was alright…” 

Erandur joins them by the fire,

“Oh, we’ve been living quietly for a little while since it’s just the two of us living here. At the moment.”

She regards Celemir, and Celemir openly stares back, silent.

“I didn’t expect to find you here…” Celemir merely blinks but doesn’t deign a verbal response.

Madena… It’s a common Breton’s name, and she hasn’t quite lost her accent despite living in Skyrim. Had she somehow passed on word back to High Rock? No, it’s too far-fetched. The woman’s a Great War veteran, not an Imperialist nor Stormcloak, and definitely not a spy. Although, as one inner voice shouts over the rest, she would have a good alibi.

Erandur joins them by the hearth and rescues the conversation,

“He’s been helping me quite a lot.” Madena asks,

“Including the nightmares problem?”

“That, and he also went to Winterhold for me, during the Ataxia outbreak.”

Madena hums in approval.

“The Jarl still owes you both quite a bit for that. Had the outbreak spread… Nevermind, it’s never good to dwell on such things.”

Celemir hopes that she’ll finally ignore him now. She gets to the point instead,

“May I have a look around?”

Being the Jarl’s court wizard, they couldn’t deny that request. Erandur smiles slightly,

“Ah, um, certainly.”

Erandur and Madena regard each other with hesitant kindness. Madena asks a seemingly endless train of questions about the temple, and most of Erandur’s answers are varying forms of ‘I don’t know.’ It’s almost entertaining to watch Erandur hide the truth.

Madena hums and nods as Erandur takes them from room to room. Her eyes scan the chambers, as if she were silently jotting down notes. Occasionally, Erandur brings her into conversation when discussing the warding magics laid within the walls, and her vast knowledge of the arcane shows itself. Knowledge that she doesn’t want to use.

When the tour concludes, Erandur, bless him, offers the court wizard a bed for the night, seeing how dusk had fallen and the way back was dangerous. Worst yet, Madena accepts the offer.

Before dinner, Celemir tries to make himself scarce. Erandur seems to enjoy Madena’s company, and Celemir doesn’t want to intrude on that.

“I think I could cut some wood. Surely, it isn’t that late?” Erandur frowns slightly at that,

“Oh, alright, but don’t forget about your scarf by the door. Wear it around your face, if you’ll be long.”

Celemir does that and leaves the two of them. He hopes they’ll get along. Erandur could probably use more company and friends. There used to be Habd, but the man’s preoccupied with mending relations between himself and his family.

 _Family_. What a strange word. The axe cuts down another sapling. He ties it to the others. His breath fogs against scarf covering the lower half of his face. He doesn’t understand it, on a fundamental level, but he knows that people like having them. Erandur might like having one, a family of his own. He’s a priest of Mara. Vows would not bar him from it, and he could move on with his life.

Celemir sits in the snow on the hills that overlook the temple and Dawnstar, cut saplings beside him for company. The wind howls somewhere in the hill beneath, going unmet by wolf-song. In silence, the fog dissipates. He can think properly.

Madena is dangerous, but she won’t act on it. She always met Jarl Skald’s orders to join the Stormcloak Army with a level gaze and icy refusal, each and every time. He likes Madena for this, more than he’ll ever care to admit, which makes disliking her harder.

She came here a for a reason. Perhaps it was just the Jarl’s concerns, but it could have been see if the knights carted him back off to High Rock. Her timing couldn’t be more suspect.

Celemir finds his answer later that night once he’s caught Madena alone in the library. He strolls up, tall but silent. 

“Hope you didn’t have any problems with the snow drifts.”

A sharp intake of breath answers him. Madena whips around.

She is well-known for her talents as a Destruction mage, she couldn’t have had any issues melting through the snow drifts. Madena knows this too, and she reveals it by the tense smile on her face, 

“Oh, none at all. The way had been packed down, strangely enough.”

“I’d only been in town just the other day. I guess it hadn’t snowed as much as I thought.” Celemir returns a borrowed book back onto the shelf. Madena continues,

“I could’ve sworn I saw a group of visitors heading your way the other day. Knights, I think.”

“Knights?”

“They had plate armor, and if I recall, the style was common in High Rock. Very ornamental, like the kind you’d see in pageantry. I don’t think we’ve ever gotten knights this way before. It was odd.” Madena picks up a book and idly runs her fingers over the bound leather,

“I’m from High Rock, as you can probably tell by my accent. Chevaliers are common there and… Powerful.” Or, in other words, corrupt to the core. Celemir agrees,

“Almost as bad as thanes, if I recall.”

“Worse.” Madena draws in a slow breath. When she releases it, she lets it out,

“I was worried.”

“Uh-huh.” Celemir remarks without inflection in his voice. Madena gestures with her hands as she speaks,

“So, I... I know how they can be, and it was just such a weird thing. I thought, surely, they had other business in Skyrim, or maybe they were some of reinforcements to the Imperial lines west of here. But they never said…”

“Erandur was the one who met with them. Alone. I about had a heart-attack when I learned of it.”

He watches Madena’s reaction carefully. Worry marks her face,

“Erandur?”

“Yeah, maybe it was good thing I wasn’t there. I don’t know what would’ve happened.” He imagines that the answer lies in his dead stare. Celemir does know what would’ve happened, and the ruin that would’ve been struck. When it came to life or death, he could make split-second decisions and survive, but most situations outside combat needed more tact, more thought.

“I’ve seen what you’ve brought in for Skald in the past. You would’ve been fine, and I guess Erandur is too. He doesn’t look too shaken up or anything.” Madena narrows her dark eyes,

“But you… You think I had something to do with this, don’t you?”

“Upset that they failed?”

She rounds on Celemir, and Celemir takes a step back.

“Erandur has been one of the few good things to ever come out of Dawnstar. If anything happened to him…” She stops, hand resting on the small end table where the lantern-flame gutters. The anger leaves her with another drawn out sigh,

“Look, I know you killed Silus last autumn, and I’m not surprised you did it. The only other people here who could’ve done such a thing were the Dark Brotherhood, but _somehow_ , I don’t think anyone’s taken up in that sanctuary just off the shore. You’ve killed a lot, and you’ve got a penchant for violence.”

‘ _Penchant?_ ’ His lips curls at the word. 

“So have you.” And there’s a facetious bite in his words when he says,

“Must be difficult, having to give quarters to the Thalmor here.”

Her face turns, and she glares at him icily, 

“Was it them, then? Who gave you the job?” Madena asks. Celemir returns with,

“Rather know how you figured it out, seeing how you’re so damn smart.”

“That doesn’t matter. No one else has figured it out. The only thing that does matter, maybe more than you or me, is the Mehrunes Razor. Silus had a fragment of it. What did you do with it? It wasn't in the ruins.”

“I hid it somewhere where no one will find it.” Celemir remembers the ruins of the Hall. The Vigilant of Stendarr and vampire corpses laid scatter, withering. When the sun struck, you could hear the vampires sizzling as their bodies desiccated in the light, soon to burst into flame. He tore into the hall and buried the hilt in the basement, then forced the ruined hall to collapse on top. With the snows burying it now, the hilt might as well have found itself a grave. 

Madena presses,

“But you didn’t give to the Thalmor.”

“No…?” 

“That’s _one_ good thing to come out of this situation, I suppose. Last thing we need to do is give the Thalmor, of all people, more Daedric artifacts.” She curls a lock of her hair around her finger as she thinks,

“But I can only assume that you did something truly awful in High Rock for a bunch of knights to come after you.”

“But you didn’t send for them.” 

“Neither would I, nor _could_ , for that matter.” Madena repeats,

“I only wanted to make sure Erandur was alright. I admire the mer. I don’t know what your relationship is with him, but he clearly cares for you. A lot… All he really talked about while you were gone was _you_.” She doesn’t say the word with vitriol. Rather, she sounds like she surprised herself by admitting it aloud. 

Celemir avoids her gaze. A part of him rejoices in knowing that about Erandur, but another hurts for it.

“We both know I brought those knights here. Erandur got rid of them, but I don’t want him fighting my battles for me.”

 _I don’t want to be fighting either_ , he thinks. Madena blinks in astonishment,

“ _He_ got rid of them? I thought they just…”

“Erandur’s a skilled wizard and alchemist. Though, he doesn’t look it.” Madena puts two and two together in seconds. She nods, understanding. Madena finally puts the book back onto the table.

“Celemir?”

“Hm?”

“You can be a better person. Put violence behind you. You’ll be happier when you do. Trust me.” Madena adds,

“If you two ever need anything, come talk to me. I’ll be in touch.” 

Celemir, not knowing a response, stays silent. He doesn’t know if he believes her words or not, whether her offer is out of pity or not. 

In either case, she slips away into the dark of the temple and slips out before dawn.  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i never quite got around to writing about erandur's past as an alchemist. had to do a rewrite because it just wasn't working, so that's why this chapter took so long :(( 
> 
> also madena showed up and was like 'hey, i'm in the story now. too bad." so, i might have to update character tags. i'm not sure yet.


End file.
